| Despite efforts made by some graduate management education programs to develop students' people skills, a gap remains between the technical and analytical skills that are the focus of many MBA courses and the interpersonal skills that organizations seek in MBA graduates. To narrow that gap, this two-phase conjoint study ascertained which combination of interpersonal skills is most desired in MBA graduates by Dallas-Fort Worth hiring managers.;The methodology used in phase 1 consisted of one-on-one interviews with local hiring experts. Results of this phase identified the following microskills as most important to managerial interpersonal success: assertiveness, political processes, collaborative bargaining (influence skills); asking probing questions, giving feedback, and reflecting on what others say (communication skills); diagnostic skills, intervention skills, preparing, and presenting (intellectually oriented skills); and empathy. These four categories of interpersonal microskills comprised the attributes of an online choice-based conjoint survey conducted in phase 2, using Sawtooth Software's suite of conjoint analysis programs. The survey was completed by a purposive sample of 207 hiring managers from 26 organizations in the Dallas-Fort Worth area. Respondents indicated their preferences for hiring MBA graduates with various combinations of adequate, above average, and superior interpersonal skills.;Part-worth utilities of the attribute competency levels were calculated using Hierarchical Bayes estimation techniques. The impact that each interpersonal skill had on respondents' choices and the hiring likelihood of differently skilled MBA graduates was established based on the results of market simulations.;Key findings revealed that communication skills had the greatest impact on hiring decisions and that empathy had the least impact. Based on the combinations of interpersonal attributes considered in this study, it was determined that Dallas-Fort Worth managers would be most likely to hire an MBA graduate who possessed superior communication skills, above average influence skills, above average intellectually oriented skills, and adequate empathy skills.;Key words. management interpersonal skills, conjoint analysis, MBA graduates, hiring managers. |
